Re: Stereo's Future

[P3D Larry Berlin <lberlin@xxxxxxxxx>]

>Date: Fri, 10 Oct 1997
>From: P3D Michael Kersenbrock writes:
>.........
>"Planar matrixes" is how memories have been built for the last 25 years.
>
>> or multi-dimensional arrays?
>
>Not yet.  That's been a long time wish, "not there yet".  Their big
>announcement of using di-bits is a "trick" that's been used for
>at least 20 years or so.  Signetics used that for a CAM design I
>think it was a VERY long time ago.  "Di-bits" also is the term
>I recall Signetics using, I don't know what Intel will call this
>new reinvention.

*****  So why haven't multi-dimensional arrays been developed already? Or
are they waiting for it to be done in the hardware?

>...............(I said).........................
>> ******  Cost is a function of several things. A fundamentally different and
>> simpler technology would tend to be cheaper than existing digital cameras
>> that are based on the CCD. Especially when miniaturized, mass produced and
>> carefully mass marketed. The difficult technical stuff would be software
>> oriented and hardware supported.
>
>Yes, but consider the fundamentals.  What's the fundamental difference between
>a digital camera and a film based one?  It's that the film is replaced by
>an electronic imaging mechanism.  So to get cost-parity, the electronic 
>imaging (and data storage) mechanism needs to cost about what the film
>winder/rewinder and film-speed finger thingies cost.  Quite a challange,
>especially for 40-Megapixel resolution with current production technology. 
>The Flash memory cost by itself is a challange.

*****  When you remove the need for ALL film related mechanisms and
controls, you greatly simplify the total system in mechanical terms. That by
itself is quite a cost savings in design, use of material, amount of labor,
mfg. cost, etc. Then consider the cost factors related to film that exist
outside the camera itself. Then for digital cameras, add in the benefits of
on camera image processing and filtering, special effects and simple editing
tasks, and instant images...

Existing memory technology is getting denser and cheaper per unit. If the
next level of development were to redesign using multidimensional
technology, memory would get even denser and cheaper again. The theory and
math have existed for a long time, I believe, just hasn't been adapted to
our systems yet. There's lots of improvement we can expect and a few
surprise turns that can improve projections based on what it looks like
right now. Some reasonable configuration seems within expectation range.


>.............
>> ******  If Aunt Mildred has a computer and uses email, the internet and
>
>A very big if.  The percentage of people using computer, email and the internet
>is still quite small.  So chances are Aunt Mildred doesn't have that stuff.
>Buying that stuff for photo's is added to the digital camera's price.

*****  Like other popular technologies before it, the computer is gaining
access to more and more homes for very powerful reasons, few having anything
to do with the style of camera one owns. Whatever the forces, it's growing
presence does influence our choice of preferred tools. 


>>.........(I said)...........
>> various other computer tools, she will love the convenience of viewing their
>> Zoo shots, in full screen color stereo, with LCS glasses, or polarized
>> glasses. Many color printers produce very nice results and services abound
>
>Even if a person likes seeing images that way, it doesn't mean that they'd
>like to have that be the way they see them.  I like to see movies at the
>movie theatre, but I would NOT like it if that were the only way to see them.
>Not even my first choice because it's not "handy" -- as well as being
expensive.
>I'd want that to be the once-in-a-while method, not the norm.

*****  There are many reasons for the use of graphics, images, or visual
stimulus of any kind. Some of them easily apply to LCS viewing systems.
Others may not. Remember that any computer/color monitor can handle 3D as
anaglyphic information, and other viewing options too. If you don't want to
use your computer, you might use or do something else. That's your choice.
It's great to have choices.

We are a long way from having explored all the ways to use stereoscopic 3D
images for practical or entertainment purposes. The best part of the
adventure has just begun.

>....................  I even now have a pair of LCD
>glasses (the "free" ones, they arrived yesterday).  However, I still would
>NOT want that to be my primary method of viewing.  

*****  I have the Total3D board with LCS goggles and it IS my preferred
method for stereo viewing with visiting friends. For myself I do more
crossed viewing than any other method. 

>For one thing, the
>computer sits in "my" room above the garage.  If I have friends over, I'm
>either to move my monster computer setup into the living room, or invite
>them up over the garage?  That'll be better than pulling out a photo-album
>and sitting on the sofa next to the fireplace and looking at the photos of
>our trip to the zoo?  While sipping a rum toddy?  :-) :-)  I don't think so,
> and if there were *anyone* on this planet easy to convice, it'd be me.

****  Pick your own circumstances and image mediums. That's fine. Don't
think that things will always stay the same either. Maybe you have yet to
experience something you like better?  *You* have to find or define whatever
that is.


>................
>That's why I have hope for living/family room based HDTV's with
>integral computer (Gate's "vision" which at first I thought dumb,
>but have grown to see the logic in it).  But that's a long
>time off.  Even with the mandated switchover schedule.

*****  With parallel developments in streaming video capabilities, I
sometimes wonder if the networks could lose 80% of their regulars to an
internet full of different and perhaps more interesting options?


>>............(I said)......................
>> *****  First, I gave no timeline. Merely noted that the necessary components
>> exist now. *If* put together now, they could become a product reality in
>> some reasonable time frame. Still an unknown time frame. Consumer level
>
>Although not familiar with the new process that gives film-resolution
>for real-time photographs

*****  There is NO single technology that can do film-quality resolution
digital imaging, even with the current hardware options on the horizon.
However, the new or even the existing hardware, in combination with a couple
other existing technologies, would reach the specific goal of film-quality
resolution+. The official trend as someone recently reminded us, is downhill
because supposedly the public doesn't care how little resolution they get.
What the surveys are leaving out is the potential in marketing, as well as
what those same sampled persons would do with a radically better and simpler
option than they currently know about. Marketing can build a reason in
consumer minds for the use of just about anything you care to name. That's
their specialty. What will be used to sell a better camera system remains to
be seen. Lets get the camera first. If it can fulfill it's design goals it
would be marketable. 

>....................
>I still don't see the solution.  Ones you've mentioned aren't acceptable
>for 2D photo replacements for the general snapshot taker.  

*****  I'm not going to spell it out any clearer. It exists, with benefits
to the general snapshot taker,  whether or not you understand it. And
whether or not anyone buys it!  :-)

Larry Berlin

Email: lberlin@xxxxxxxxx
http://www.sonic.net/~lberlin/
http://3dzine.simplenet.com/


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